We Belong Here, Together, in the Light

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
December 28, 2025
1 Christmas
Isaiah 61:10-62:3
Psalm 147:13-21
John 1:1-18

Happy Christmas, everyone. This is the fourth day of the twelve-day season of Christmas, the season of light shining in the darkness. For us in the northern hemisphere, this is the dark time of year. The days have been getting shorter and the nights getting longer, right up until the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, after which the days start getting longer and the nights start getting shorter. The Winter Solstice is, then, a celebration of the return of the light.

So, the date for Christmas was chosen to be on that longest night of the year so that we celebrate the light of Jesus coming into the world at the same time that we celebrate the return of the light into the world. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” Reverent Hannah, the head priest here at Trinity Episcopal Church preached on Christmas Eve, and she noted that we often think of light as good and darkness as bad, and she pointed out that there are times when we also need darkness.

The season of darkness, of winter, is also a season of rest for the earth. We need rest. We sleep in darkness. We have lights to guide us in the darkness, and without the darkness, we wouldn’t be able to notice the light. Darkness is a part of creation. It’s needed. Darkness can also come from hurt and trauma, and that darkness can definitely hurt us, yet even that darkness has a place. It’s our body’s way of protecting us. Anger, fear? They are natural responses to being hurt. Anger and fear can help lead us to safety. When we are overcome by anger and fear, however, then we become lost in the darkness. So, “the light [of Jesus] shines in the darkness, and the darkness [does] not overcome it.” 

Think about guilt as well. Guilt may feel like darkness, guilt over ways we’ve harmed others. More accurately, guilt is how we feel the darkness we’ve caused. It’s a good thing. Guilt helps us know we’ve done wrong and that darkness we feel helps nudge us back to the light. That is, unless, we get overcome by the darkness, and our guilt turns to shame.

When that happens, we become lost and alone in the darkness. Who has felt alone, ashamed of what you’ve done or ashamed of what someone has done to you? That shame is darkness overtaking us, no longer helping us heal or guiding us to the light. Shame keeps us alone, telling us no one will ever understand. No one will ever forgive us. No one will ever accept us if we let this secret shame be known. 

Shame tells us we are unloved and unlovable. Jesus tells us that shame is wrong. 

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. 

We are loved. We are lovable. Whatever we have done, and whatever has been done to us, we belong in the light. That’s why God became human, to help heal us and, when we are overcome by darkness, to guide us back to the light. 

The Word of God became flesh and lived among us, and his name, Jesus, comes from the Hebrew name Yehoshua, which means “God is salvation,” “God saves,” “God is deliverance.” To believe in Jesus’ name means to believe that God is the salvation we seek. God is the deliverance we need. God is the light which shines in our darkness, and God is the light which our darkness cannot overcome. Into our darkness, God’s light shines, saying, “Come, my beloved child.”

Every morning when we rise, God’s light shines in the darkness. See, sleep is like a tiny, daily darkness, which we call the shadow of death, the big darkness. Now, even that darkness is not a bad thing. Our bodies wear out, and death is a natural part of life. Death is the great rest at the end of life, and yet even the darkness of death does not overcome the light of life. 

Jesus showed us in his resurrection, that death does not have the final say. There is life, stronger even than death. That life is the light of God, and the darkness of death does not overcome it. Be at peace even with death, then, trusting that God’s light is not overcome by the darkness, and that life will return. Then, live with the peace that comes from that belief. “God is salvation.” 

God is salvation for all people and for all the mess and darkness of our lives.

When Jesus grew up, he was friends with sinners. He taught forgiveness. He healed people and proclaimed forgiveness. Jesus was the light of God shining for people who were lost and alone in the dark. Jesus is still the light of God shining for people who are lost and alone in the dark. 

So, Jesus’ church is a community for people who are lost and alone in the dark. We’re not the good folks proclaiming judgement on the world. We’re the messed up, broken folks who come to Jesus and the church and find that we’re not alone. When we come to Jesus and the community of the church, we find that don’t need to be alone and ashamed. We don’t need to be lost in the darkness. Jesus says, “I love you. I see you. Come to me, and join with the rest of this rag tag band of screwups. Join with this group of hurt, beaten, and damned people, and find that you’re not actually damned. Those thoughts are just the darkness overcoming you. Come, be loved, and be healed.” That’s the light shining in the darkness and the darkness not overcoming it.

How many have been a part of the church who had murdered someone in the past, who had raped someone in the past? How many have been drug dealers and gang members? How many have been part of the church who are ex-convicts or current convicts? How many have been part of the church who made fortunes at the expense of others and found their lives empty? How many have prostituted themselves, doing whatever they felt they needed to in order to survive? How many, of all of the above, did all of those things because they felt they needed to in order to survive, or because they were so hurt and beaten down, that they just didn’t care who they hurt anymore?

The church is full of people who have been overcome by darkness. The church is full of people who have then found healing together, as we recognize our own hurts and darkness in one another, and we also see our belovedness and the light of God in one another. The church is full of people who have found healing in the name of Jesus. “God is salvation.” The church is full of people who have found healing believing that God is light, life, and healing for all of us together.

So stay, and keep returning. Keep joining together recognizing one another as God’s beloved, because we are loved. We are lovable. Whatever we have done, and whatever has been done to us, we belong here, together, in the light. 

The questioners, the loners, the kids with behavior problems...

Brad Sullivan

2 Christmas, Year B

December 31, 2017

Emmanuel, Houston

John 1:1-18

The questioners, the loners, the kids with behavior problems...

Over the weekend, a priest friend of mine and I talking and joking together about challenges of church life, and she said, “Yeah, church would be great if it wasn’t for all the people.”  It’s a common joke about the imperfections of the Church which is the ecclesia (or gathering) of Jesus’ friends.  Jesus’ ecclesia of friends began as a rather rag tag group of also-rans, the island of misfit toys type folks who needed and wanted the love and belonging which Jesus was offering.  Being a rag tag group of folks, the church was always an imperfect bunch, and that proud tradition has continued on to this day.

As the church, the ecclesia, the gathering of Jesus’ friends we’re a group of people who follow in Jesus’ ways, except when we don’t.  We love well, giving compassion to those who really need it, to those whose lives have been shattered and need someone to sit with them among the broken pieces of their life and slowly begin sweeping them up and putting the pieces back together.  That is, except for when we don’t love well for a variety of reasons, when our own lives just aren’t up to it, or when our own brokenness prevents us from seeing the broken person in front of us as a person, and we instead just see a broken thing.

As Jesus’ ecclesia, his gathering of friends, we love God and love people above all else.  That’s our way of being.  Some friends of mine recently told me that in their efforts to love God and people above all else, they’ve been going through their house get rid of anything that they would be really upset about if it was broken by a child…or an adult.  They want their home to be a place of love, where adults and children know they are loved, and that they are loved more than the stuff in their house.  That’s a great model for the church, where we love God and love people above all else, except of course when, in our efforts to love God, we end up loving things, and we place that love of things in front of loving people.  It happens.  The church is imperfect because it is irrevocably peopled with people.

In John’s Gospel this morning, we heard that the Word of God, which is God, is also the life and light of all, and that the Word of God became human, as Jesus, and lived among us as one of us.  That was really his first mistake, wasn’t it?  The Word of God already had a perfect ecclesia going, a perfect gathering of beloved friends with the Father and the Holy Spirit.  This perfect ecclesia remained perfect until the Word became flesh and lived among us.  Then, Jesus joined us to the ecclesia of God, along with all of our imperfections.  That’s kind of the beauty of it.  If God had wanted a perfect ecclesia, then I suppose he wouldn’t have become human at all.  We wouldn’t celebrate Christmas, and there would be no baby Jesus, or adult Jesus, or even teenage angsty Jesus.  There would just be the perfect ecclesia of God, without humanity, but God didn’t want that perfect ecclesia, a perfect church.  God wanted the ecclesia of Jesus’ friends, the church, the gathering with humanity, along with all of our imperfections, even if that meant that we mucked things up a bit.  So, “the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”

In becoming human and living among us, God showed us his love for us, not his desire for us to be perfect.  I mean, I suppose it’d be nice, but God showed that he loves us, warts and all.  He then formed the church, the ecclesia or gathering of Jesus’ friends, so that we could further share his love for people, warts and all.  Jesus wanted not a perfect ecclesia, but an ecclesia that shared his heart for people and his willingness to sacrifice personal comfort and convenience (and quite a bit more than that) for the sake of people…especially the ones no one else seemed to care that much about. 

The questioners, the loners, the kids with behavior problems.  Seek them out, invite them in, and love them more than your stuff, Jesus has taught his church, and be willing to sacrifice your personal comfort and convenience for their sake. 

The people who don’t have life figured out and have spent their life mucking it up for themselves.  The people who have life figured out and learned from a young age that life is harsh and cruel.  The people who have been rejected by their peers, rejected by society, rejected by their church or family.  Seek them out, invite them in, and love them more than your stuff, Jesus has taught his church, and be willing to sacrifice your personal comfort and convenience for their sake.

The people who aren’t like us, who make us uncomfortable, whose very existence disrupts our world, shattering the illusions we created to make our world seem safe.  The people whose need is greater than we can provide, whose loneliness and despair are deeper than we can see, and whose desire for connection and companionship is greater and more beautiful than even they are aware.  Seek them out, invite them in, and love them more than your stuff, Jesus has taught his church, and be willing to sacrifice your personal comfort and convenience for their sake.

We’re not going to fix every problem or make any lives perfect.  The lives of all people still have that one flaw in them, that all lives involve people and are therefore irrevocably messed up, messed up just like the church, the ecclesia, gathering of Jesus’ friends, and Jesus didn’t form his ecclesia of friends in order to make a perfect institution.  Jesus formed his church, his gathering of friends, in order to share with us his light, because he simply wanted us to be a part of the life of communion shared between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and so with all our imperfections, we reach out with that same light to others, and we sit with them in their imperfections, not to make them perfect, not necessarily to fix them, but simply to dwell with them, to shine some light into the darkness of their lives, and to join in communion with them, becoming friends, and joining together in the Church, ecclesia, the gathering, of Jesus’ friends.